Best Friends (Until Someone Better Comes Along) (5 page)

But after two days of the same boring routine, I got antsy. The cabin was way too small for my mom and me to sit and stew in all day, and it was muggy and hot. So late in the afternoon of our third day at the resort, I decided to sneak down to the lake for a quick swim. I strategically waited until most of the adults were working in someone's cabin and the
other kids were all out canoeing. I didn't want to have to talk to anyone.

I plodded down to the lake in my swimsuit and waded into the water. I was surprised to find it was cool and refreshing, and you didn't really notice the greenish color when you were up close to the water. I floated for a while, pretending I was in a Caribbean pool, then returned to my cabin to hole away. But the next day, I snuck down to the lake in the afternoon again, just as everyone else was heading back up the hill for a barbecue.

“Hey, Isabella!” Bailey said, rushing over. “What have you been doing all day? You can totally join us for some s'mores in a little bit.”

I loved s'mores. But did I love s'mores more than I loved my reputation? “No, thanks.” I felt just the tiniest bit bad for saying no, since Bailey and Ava both seemed so desperate to spend time with me.

On the morning of our fifth full day at the lake, I realized I'd moved beyond bored. My mom had started calling me sullen, the inside of our cabin smelled like rotten broccoli and chicken, and I was out of books to read. So I slipped on my pink swimsuit and headed to the lake right after Brennan made his way down the path.

I'd been watching Brennan over the past few days, and decided he was definitely cute. He was certainly worth leaving the cabin for. I dropped my towel on the beach, then waded slowly out into the swimming area. Once my body was used to the cool water, I dove under. When I popped up to the surface again, I rolled over on my back and looked toward shore to see who was watching me.

No one!

I stared at Brennan, willing him to notice me, but he was busy with Ava and Madeline.

I did a handstand underwater, then checked to see who'd noticed
that
.

Not a single person had even glanced my way.

I tried swimming underwater, out to the buoy that had gotten Ava so much attention on our first day at the lake. I dove deep and pulled through the water with my arms, hoping someone was watching. But instead of making it there, I only made it about halfway and then I had to pop out of the water gasping for air. I took a breath too soon and choked on a huge mouthful of water. A weed wrapped around my stickyoutey ear, and I suddenly sounded like I was suffering from whooping cough.

Finally, someone noticed.

“You okay?” Brennan called, shielding his eyes from the sun on the beach.

I spluttered and coughed again.

“Do you need a hand?” he yelled.

I waved my hand, as if to say no, but he must have taken it as a sign that I was drowning or something. Suddenly, he came splashing out into the water toward me, carrying a toddler-size Disney Princess life jacket under his arm. Cinderella and Snow White looked like they were dancing together in the same floaty scene. “I'm fine,” I finally managed to choke out.

Brennan stopped short. After a moment, he threw the life jacket at me and ordered, “You should probably wear that while you're out there alone. Just in case.”

Fabulous. Just what I need. A baby life jacket. I swam back to shore, dropped the life jacket on the dock, and hustled back up to my cabin. How humiliating!

As soon as I stepped inside the cabin, my mom pounced. “Why are you hunched over like that?” She glanced up from the kitchen table, where her papers were stacked around her in perfectly organized piles.

“Like what?” I asked, straightening.

“You're all slouched.” She studied me carefully, letting her eyes travel from the tip of my head to my toes. It was almost
as though she'd been sitting there for hours, just waiting for someone to pick on. Guess who that lucky someone was? “Have you gotten any exercise at all since we've arrived?”

“Nope.”

“ ‘Nope' is not a word,” she reminded me. “Maybe you should get out for a walk or something?”

“I'm happy inside,” I lied, through clenched teeth. “Delighted, in fact. Ecstatic. Overjoyed.” I hoped I was using enough excellent vocabulary that my mom would just let me pass through.

“You don't look happy
or
ecstatic. You're scowling.”

I snapped. “Because you're picking on me! Wouldn't you scowl if you were being attacked?”

“I'm not attacking,” she explained in a condescending voice. “I'm helping.”

“Well, your helping isn't helping!” I threw my towel in a wet heap on the floor and hustled to my room. I hated feeling like
I
was the weirdo every time I was around the other kids on this horrible work trip, and my mom wasn't making me feel better at all. I didn't get why she had to pick all the time. Why couldn't she just let me be? And where was my dad when I needed someone to stick up for me? With Chuck and Craig and creepy John, that's where.

As a kid, when I was sad, my dad and mom seemed to understand when I just needed a hug . . . but now, the moment either one of them sensed weakness, they attacked me. It wasn't fair.

I picked up my phone and silently pleaded for new messages from my friends. But there was nothing. I hadn't heard from Heidi or Sylvie in over two hours. I sat down on top of my perfectly made bed in my wet swimsuit and stared up at the ceiling, fuming.

When my mom peeked into my room, I quickly picked up my cell and pretended I was doing something important. I opened the TMZ app. Which was important. Sort of.

“Your phone is becoming a problem,” Mom said quietly from the curtained doorway.

“How?” I asked, refusing to look at her. She didn't deserve a proper conversation, with eye contact and everything. I could tell when my mom was just picking on me for the sake of picking on something. After almost thirteen years, I knew her well enough to know she had to be at least as bored as I was. She had already reorganized the contents of the kitchen cabinets in our cabin. She'd ironed all of her clothes—twice. I knew
I
was the only project my mother had left, and I wasn't looking forward to the three weeks we had left to
just look at each other inside our tiny little “cottage.”

She took a deep breath, then said, “I think maybe I need to take your phone so you can actually get out there and enjoy yourself this month.”

“Enjoy myself?” I snorted. “As if. The other kids at this place are freaks who act like babies, and the lake smells like manure, and there's nothing fun to do!”

“There's plenty to do.”

“Really, Mom? So what have you been doing to take advantage of this fun family vacation spot? Sitting inside with the iron and your laptop?”

“What I do is none of your business. What
you
do, however,
is
my business.”

I laughed out loud. It almost sounded like one of Ava's snorts. “Right.”

“Hand over the phone,” she ordered.

“Not a chance.”

“Give me the phone, and I'll return it to you at the end of the month. If you put up a fight now, I'll flat-out cancel your service, and you can wait until you can afford to buy a phone for yourself.” She raised her eyebrows, challenging me to find a smart retort. “Your choice.”

“Are you kidding me?” I said, suddenly realizing she
was serious. She was trying to take away my only lifeline to home, to normal people, to my friends. If she stole my phone, all I'd have left was Coco. My puppy was adorable, but she was happy doing three things, over and over, all day every day: running, sleeping, and licking her own butt. She wasn't exactly the best conversationalist. “You wouldn't do that to me. It's like I'm a hostage or something.”

“I would, and I am.” She held out her hand. “Your father and I discussed the situation last night, and now I'm making the executive decision that it's time for you to give it up. And don't think, even for a moment, that you've got things bad. All you've done since we arrived at the lake is lie in your room, hugging your phone. I want to see you outside, doing kid things, instead of being stuck in here acting like a brat.”

“I'm not a kid, so don't expect me to be out there playing hopscotch and popping bugs. Besides, you're the one acting like a brat.” I regretted my words the moment they crossed my lips. Talking back was one thing, but calling my mother names was another thing altogether. “I didn't mean that,” I said. I chewed at my lip, wishing that was enough to distract my mom from processing what I'd just said. I just didn't think it was fair that she was allowed to hide out in the cabin, and I wasn't.

“Your phone,” she said calmly, holding out her hand. “Which is, technically,
my
phone. And as we've already discussed, you also have no right to comment on what I am or am not doing. I'm your mother, and what I say goes.”

I opened my mouth, then closed it again. Surely, she was just having a bad day. She couldn't really take my phone—the phone I'd just gotten that spring, after months of begging and promising—away from me for the rest of the summer. Could she?

“And how many times do I have to tell you to stop picking at your nails!” she said, sounding all frantic. I looked down and realized I'd been absentmindedly picking at my
other
pinkie nail for who knows how long.

Before I could stop myself, I began to cry. Not the loud, messy kind of tears I used to conjure up to get what I wanted at the mall when I was a kid. But the slow kind of tears that sort of bubbled up and stung my eyes before they ran hot down my cheeks. My mom looked at me blubbering like some kind of wimp, and shook her head. “Don't even try,” she warned. “Tears are
not
going to make me feel bad for you. This is your fault.”

Then she turned and walked out, muttering something under her breath.

At that moment, the only thing I could think about was how much I hated my mom. And how much I hated my dad, for getting this stupid job and never hanging out with me anymore. And I also hated myself, for turning into a huge baby and losing control in front of my mom.

But after a few minutes of letting myself wallow in self-pity, I realized it was time to do what I do best: take charge and make things go my way. How hard could it be to make these people adore me?

I
rubbed at my cheeks
, trying to erase the tear streaks from my skin. They were a visible reminder that my mom was the one person who could always make me feel totally worthless. As I pulled a brush through my hair, someone knocked at the cabin door.

“Hello?” I heard Bailey yell through the screen door. “Isabella?”

I snuffled one last time, making sure I was done crying. Tears weren't going to help my cause with these people. Then I headed out into the living room, where Mom was already talking with Bailey.

“I'm sure she'd love to go canoeing,” I heard her say. “Izzy was just saying how much she wanted to do something with all of you.”

I stared at my mom, speechless. I was so
not
just saying that. My mom was making me look desperate. That I didn't need.

“Oh, great!” Bailey chirped. “We need one more person for Canoe Wars, or the weights will be all weird in the boats. Which is totally not fair.”

“Sounds fun,” I grumbled, without any enthusiasm at all. I wasn't going to act all chipper and let my mom win. “Let's go.” I pushed through the busted front door and wrapped my arm through Bailey's. Then I dragged my new friend—really, that's what Bailey was going to have to be now that I didn't have a phone—down the steps, along the path, and toward the lake.

Bailey followed behind me. Like a puppy. Pitiful.

“So what is Canoe Wars, anyway?” I asked, as we neared the lake.

Bailey grinned at me, totally oblivious to the fact that I was not at all happy. But even though her clueless grin bugged me, there was something mischievous in her smile that I found the tiniest bit intriguing. Bailey shook her head and said, “You'll see.”

“Tell me what it is, or I'm not doing it,” I said.

Bailey raised her eyebrows. After a long pause, where
neither of us said anything, Bailey laughed. Finally, she said, “You don't have to do this, you know. I'm not going to force you to get in the boat.”

“No,” I said, softening. “I'll do it. I just want to know what I'm getting into before I agree to do something stupid.”

“I already told you, you'll find out.” Bailey reached down and scratched at a bug bite on her leg.

Fine. I would play by her rules. This once.

“And just so you know,” Bailey said, wrinkling her nose so her freckles all bunched up into a little cluster of spots in the center of her face. “It probably wouldn't kill you to be a little nicer to everyone. We all know you don't want to be here—but maybe you could try to have a decent time, just for the month? We're all stuck at the lake together, and it's going to be a lot more fun for everyone if you ditch the attitude.” She smiled, all smug. “When we get back to school, you can act however you want to act and be who you want to be. But for now, just try to be a little less awful. Okay?”

My mouth dropped open.
That
I was not expecting. No one—except my parents—had
ever
spoken to me like that before. I didn't even know how to respond.

Suddenly, Ava bounded up beside us. “Oh, good,” she said. “You're in?” She looked at me expectantly.

After a long moment, I nodded. I wasn't sure what I was agreeing to—Bailey's request, or Ava's question—but my answer to both was yes. Bailey was right. It was just a month, and there was no reason I couldn't pretend to be friends with these girls for the month. It's not like anyone at school had to know about anything that happened over the summer. Everything
would
go back to normal when school started. I'd make sure of it.